Conservatives propose foreign aid vouchers

Here’s another reason to vote Conservative (yes, Delingpole, I’m talking to you): it’ll annoy the hell out of the foreign aid professionals. Oxfam, ActionAid and the other Leftie mega-charity-cum-lobbyist behemoths are outraged at the idea that a Tory government might distribute aid vouchers, allowing individuals in developing nations to make their own choices about education and healthcare.

Oxfam, ActionAid et al would much rather that aid be handed out in bloc grants by people like them. (Please don’t call them “voluntary organisations”, by the way: they are funded by the taxpayer and by the EU, and their executives are on handsome salaries).

Their model of aid hurts both donor and recipient. It is, as Milton Friedman once observed, an expensive way of redistributing money from poor people in rich countries to rich people in poor countries. Don’t take my word for it: listen to this man. Consumer choice has worked in the developed world. Surely poorer nations deserve the same opportunity.